Seminar & Hot Water

I will start off with the Seminar from last night. I met with Christine Kromer who works with Alexa Fogel Casting. Very nice and personable even though she was under the weather with a bit of a cold.

The first part was a Q&A where Christine told us a bit about her past and what she is working on now. I found one of the Pilots that she said that she was working on particularly interesting. It is called "The Philanthropist" and the Logline is: After the tragic death of his child, a man becomes the world's first vigilante philanthropist.

Okay, I work for a lady who IS a philanthropist. Trying to figure out what could be "vigilante" about what she does is not coming readily to mind. So I am extremely curious.

Christine has the basic normal pet peeves: Be on time, be prepared, spell her name right that sort of thing.

She likes the theater and goes as often as she can. She likes people to keep in touch via postcards.

For the other part of the seminar we were paired up to do cold copy for her to see. I was paired with a very nice young lady who has just graduated and is starting out on the audition circuit. I think her name was Andrea (I really need to get better at remembering names).

Our scene from a Situation Comedy Pilot called "Pepper" that Christine had cast. The pilot wasn't picked up but she liked the script.

The reading went well and Christine said that we did a good job with the scene. Situation comedy scenes still kind of through me a little since I don't know if I should be "natural" or be "over the top". I played this one natural and Christine laughed at a couple of places so I guess I made the right choice.

We then talked for a few minutes where I told her that I had worked background on The Black Donnelly's and M.O.N.E.Y both projects that she had cast. Also, that I did a lot of theater but I was interested in moving up into larger parts in film and TV.

So we will see.

When I got home I watched the first part of the Six Feet Under Pilot with commentary.

Okay, I LOVE commentaries. I think they are great learning tools. Some of course are better than others but most of the time I feel like I learn something either about acting or the filming process in some way. On some DVD's for episodic television shows they even show some of the original auditions of the actors who got the parts, Lost and Dark Angel come to mind as having good ones. Very good to watch and to see how the people approached the auditions.

Anyway back to Six Feet Under. I learned that Four of the lead actors came from NY Theater. One Michael C. Hall was sort of plucked right off the stage of the Broadway production of Cabaret. This series was his first time in front of a camera and he got his SAG card with the pilot. Very interesting. It also reminded me of something that Christine said tonight at the Seminar. When asked about going to LA for pilot season she said that the best thing would be to wait until someone asked you to go to LA for a particular project. Let them pay the bill for you to travel or something to that effect. This just proved the point. Even though it was shot on the West Coast many of the actors were actually cast on the East Coast from the Theater.

On another continuing subject I FINALLY have hot water again. Yipeeeeee!!!!! I turned on the faucet expecting the same old cold water that I have had for the past two months and to my surprise actual HOT water came out.

This morning I had my first real shower in it seems like ages. Felt so good and I really feel clean again. I mean I did my best with the bottles and heating the water on the stove by it really never feels the same. Also the luxury of washing my hair, putting on conditioner and cleaning the bod all at the same time - priceless. I admit I stayed in the shower much longer than I usually do but I think I can be forgiven. I also immediately put all of my bottles in the recycling bin. So happy to see them go.

I have another audition this afternoon for a Student film and then another seminar tomorrow. I also submitted myself for a couple of possible background jobs today that are for Sunday and Monday.

I don't know if I will be able to post again for the next couple of days. I will try to post by text message but I don't know how that will really turn out. So anyway have a great weekend and I would love a comment or two.